Analysis

Planetlemans looks at the Audi vs Peugeot battle

© Planetlemans - Marcel ten Caat

Despite Audi beating Peugeot in the American Le Mans Series opener at Sebring most people expected the French squad to bounce back when the two teams would race each other at full strength back in Europe. Last weekend the first head-to-head fight to place at the Circuit de Catalunya near Barcelona in Spain, here is what we think of it.

Both Audi and Peugeot have been serious about the Le Mans Series. While Peugeot has its full focus on the European season and Le Mans, Audi has ordered its top drivers McNish, Capello to race in Europe instead of taking part in the American Le Mans Series. Both teams will maintain that winning Le Mans is their main target, but the Le Mans Series is something to fight for as well.

In Spain Team Peugeot Total showed its speed right from the word go and putting two cars on the front row, with the Audi Sport Team Joest cars in third and sixth place, meant Peugeot dealt the first blow to the team from Ingolstadt. Like in Sebring the Audi R10 TDI lacked the speed over a single lap. “The gap to the pole position is pretty big – bigger than expected”, said Dindo Capello after qualifying. Team mate Allan McNish was already looking ahead to the race. “We know from experience that the Audi R10 TDI is a car that is better in the race than in qualifying. That’s why I’m confident as far as the race is concerned.” said the Scot. In the French camp Michel Barge, the team’s Director, was happy about the result. “Despite facing considerably stiffer competition compared with last year, 2008’s first qualifying session enabled us to keep up our excellent habit of qualifying both cars on the front row.”

On Sunday the battle between Peugeot and Audi finally got started. Unlike the Sebring 12 Hours where the focus was on the battle of the two diesel powered cars against the LMP2 Porsches and Acura’s the Barcelona race was all about Peugeot and Audi. Right at the start of the race it was the Peugeot of Pedro Lamy that powered away, but McNish managed the best start and was in second place by the time the cars had taken turn one. For one hour the Peugeot of Minassian and the Audi of McNish battled all over the track, until the safety car came out. The decision not to make a driver change at Audi in the pit stops and good work from the Team Joest mechanics resulted in McNish leading the race when the safety car came back in.

© Planetlemans - Marcel ten Caat

Shortly after the Peugeot team hit some trouble. First it was Sarrazin’s Peugeot that was hit from behind by the Team Modena car and damaged the rear of the car. As a result of the damage and subsequent repairs the team lost nine laps. Then after an hour and a half into the race it was the Peugeot 908 driven by Marc Gene that was involved in an accident that showed the strength of the chassis. The Spanish driver, trying to pass the Speedy Lola and Barazi Zytek hit the kerbstones and went airborne, the car going into the air almost a meter high. The 908 landed on the Zytek which caused some damage to the left of the Peugeot and a retirement for the Zytek shortly after. ”There was a misunderstanding with a backmarker. In trying to avoid him, I took off on a kerb and my car landed very awkwardly. I thought it was damaged, but I can tell you that the 908 is a really strong car!” said Gené after the race.

It was then Audi that hit trouble and the R10 with McNish onboard was pushed back into the box as a result of a problem with the generator belt, costing the German squad valuable time. While the Peugeot of Gené and Minassian kept lapping the Spanish track without any problems, like the Audi of Prémat and Rockenfeller, it was the Lamy and Sarrazin car that hit trouble again. A collision with the IPB Spartak Racing Lamborghini Murcielago led to severe damage on the Peugeot and it took the team half an hour to get the car back.

In the remaining part of the race there were no significant changes in the positions and after almost six hours of racing it was a rather unexpected win for the Gené/Minassian Peugeot 908 ahead of the Prémat/Rockenfeller Audi R10. Many people would have expected the battle to go between the defending champions Lamy and Sarrazin on one side and the ALMS LMP1 champions McNish and Capello. But the bad luck for both cars handed the honours to their team mates.

While Peugeot suffered its problems after colliding with backmarkers (read: GT1 cars) the Audi problems came from mechanical failures. In the first race at Sebring both cars had mechanical problems, and it seems that the French squad solved these problems before the German team. Peugeot’s Bruno Famin said it in the best way possible: “It was a very good weekend technically because we didn’t have a single problem. All the drama resulted from race incidents! We were running with the same specification as Sebring, and the N°7 car was equipped with a certain number of elements – including the engine – that had done all the running in the American race. We now total a distance of 5,500km, while the le Mans 24 Hours will probably last something like 6,000km!”

© Planetlemans - Marcel ten Caat

Audi’s Techincal Director Ralf Jüttner was less impressed with his team’s result. “The problem with the generator belt was really unfortunate. Something like this shouldn’t happen. We need to investigate the cause because the defect destroyed Allan’s and Dindo’s (Capello) race. Making up ground to finish fifth is a nice achievement. Whether we could have won against Peugeot is hard to say. It would have definitely been a close fight.”

With the 1,000 kilometre race of Monza in two weeks time both teams will have limited time to solve any problems found. At the moment Peugeot seems to have the advantage having a car that can run the distance without mechanical problems, something that Audi can not say yet. While Barcelona was new for both squads (the DTM used a different layout), the Peugeot team has already raced at Monza last year, so they might have a slight advantage set-up wise. But the German team will more than likely be capable of finding a decent set-up for the race during the three practice sessions.

If Peugeot can stay clear of the backmarkers and Audi can guarantee a trouble free run for its R10s the battle at the fast Italian track will be very interesting and could go all the way to the end of the race. And after Monza…it is a short time before it all starts again at Spa-Francorchamps.